PAY DIRT

RNC Fundraises With Fake ‘Census’

Photo Illustration by Sarah Rogers/The Daily Beast / Photos Getty

Welcome to Pay Dirt—exclusive reporting and research from The Daily Beast’s Lachlan Markay on corruption, campaign finance, and influence-peddling in the nation’s capital. For Beast Inside members only.

The Republican Party is fundraising off the 2020 census—by pretending to conduct its own “census” that aims to dupe people into contributing.

The Republican National Committee has been sending fundraising letters billing themselves as parts of an “official 2019 congressional district census,” each containing an official-looking “document tracking code.” Though they include frequent disclosures that they are products of the RNC, and not the U.S. government, they put literal emphasis on the word “census,” underlining it throughout the letter.